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The news caused the euro to fall to 88.78p against its British counterpart, which also climbed against the dollar, Reuters reports.
Immediately after the release of the figures the pound hit $1.5005 against the greenback, before retreating slightly to be priced at $1.4972 at 11:18 GMT.
Commenting, Duncan Higgins of Caxton FX said reaction to the results was mixed.
"We expect to see the pound move steadily higher through the day," he added, noting expectations regarding a European Union meeting to discuss a way of solving the debt problems in the eurozone are "pretty low".
The retail sales figures showed a month-on-month increase of 2.1 per cent took place during February, higher than the 0.7 per cent jump that had been forecast by analysts.
However, the results also showed January's figure has been revised downwards.
Posted by Chris Weaver
